AMD 65 nanometre parts reviewed
Rant Reading them makes you dumber
By Charlie Demerjian: Donnerstag 21 Dezember 2006, 13:28
WHY IS THE quality of hardware review sites so low nowadays?
OK, there are a few good ones out there, if you read the reviews,
you will see what I mean. What reviews? The majority of the poor ones on AMD's new 65nm chips.
The review sites out there seem to have the memories of goldfish
and reasoning skills that a sub-par goldfish would scoff at.
I have pretty damn low expectations for all but a few sites out there,
and those absurdly low expectations were simply not met.
I suppose those sites that failed could take it as a sign of pride, mirrored in their Alexa rankings of late.
What am I talking about? Promises and delivery. The promises part was simple,
what did AMD promise? Did it say the first 65nm parts would clock to the moon?
Did it say anything other than there would be a modest power savings? No.
Did it deliver chips that produced modest power savings? Yes.
Did the chips come out when AMD said they would? Yes.
At the speeds promised? Yes. So why crucify it for something they never said?
By the same 'logic', AMD chips aren't available in 9000+ ratings at retail this month,
AMD is obviously going down the tubes. Intel is sucking wind for not having a cORE octo 3
at 6GHz either, the end is nigh. Look out the widow, locusts are sure to be on the horizon any second now.
What do the 65 nanometre AMDs bring to the table? Well, as we mentioned,
a little lower power, so the parts are all 65W now, that is a win.
The dies went from 183mm2 to 126mm2 also, that lowers costs for AMD by a not insubstantial number.
Yield is also 'mature' at introduction which I take to mean that the yield is > (90nm yield) * (126/183),
basically it is getting at least an equal number of good dice from each 65nm wafer as a 90nm wafer.
Does this matter to you the consumer? Nope, not at all.
If AMD lowers prices, good for it, you benefit. If it doesn't,
you do not benefit. In any case, this is totally decoupled from the size of the #*&$# die.
Its cost is its cost. Your cost is your cost. The delta between the two determines AMD's profit or loss,
but it can be arbitrarily set for short periods of time.
Last up, people seem to forget the last two years.
The exact same thing happened with the 130nm to 90nm transition.
Most of the same people decrying the 'poor performance' of the first 65nm parts
said more or less the same things at 90. Where are the huge benefits?
Why is it not doing the things we want it to but AMD never said it would?
It is sad to see the community laughed at by slow goldfish.
AMD has never had spectacular performance with the first run of any newly shrunk parts.
Those who forget history are doomed to repeat it, and I don't really have a problem with that.
What I do have a problem with is that I just spent a few hours reading several reviews and halfway through the conclusion, I realised all I got was the loss of a few IQ points, a headache,
and several hours of my life gone that I would never get back.
65nm brings AMD a lot of benefits, but you may or may not see any of it directly.
If you can't understand this, that is your problem,
may I suggest farming in an area without electricity as a new line of work?
AMD put out the parts it said it would with the specs they promised at the time promised.
The rest is your creation and problem.µ
Hats jetzt jeder verstanden?
unter Last sind es auch nur 15Watt.
